Posts published in Day: July 5, 2019

Why does the United States need the Baltics and what threatens these countries with an increasing of the American military presence? So, the United States have opposed Russia in one form or another in this region since the 1940s, when the Baltic States were not recognized as part of the USSR. This region has always been in the focus of American attention. The United States believed that it was more…

On 4th July 2019, the official Commemoration Day of Genocide against the Jews in Latvia took place. The main public event commemorates the burning of the Choral Synagogue in Rīga on the 4th of July in 1941. This date marked the beginning of the Holocaust in the territory of Latvia, and since 1990 has been dedicated to remembrance of all the Jews that were killed in the Holocaust during the…

“The Wolf of Wall Street” producer and stepson of Malaysia’s former prime minister pleaded not guilty on Friday to laundering $248 million from a state investment fund, becoming the third person in his family charged in the 1MDB scandal that helped end Najib Razak’s government last year. Riza Aziz was solemn as he appeared in court to be charged with receiving the illicit funds between 2011 and 2012 in the…

Turkey’s state-run news agency says an explosion inside a vehicle near Turkey’s border with Syria has left a number of people dead and injured. Anadolu Agency says the blast occurred Friday in the border town of Reyhanli. It was not immediately clear what caused the explosion. The report says several ambulances and police vehicles have been sent to the scene.

A Swedish court has upheld the Stockholm arbitration’s 2016 ruling, unfavorable to Lithuania, in the country’s dispute with Russian gas giant Gazprom, meaning that Lithuania failed to recoup around 1.5 billion euros in compensation for overpriced Russian natural gas. Lithuania had asked the Swedish Court of Appeal to quash the arbitration ruling. Lithuania’s Ministry of Energy told BNS Lithuania the Swedish court made the decision on Thursday to uphold the…

Leaders of Sudan’s pro-democracy movement welcomed on Friday the power-sharing agreement with the ruling military council as a victory for their “revolution,” raising hopes for an end to the three-month standoff with the generals and deadly violence. “Today, our revolution has won and our victory shines,” read a statement posted early Friday on the Facebook page of the Sudanese Professionals’ Association, which has spearheaded the protests. The emerging deal could…

Greek voters appear set to defy a surge of support populist parties across Europe in a general election Sunday, with the pro-EU center-right opposition firmly in the lead. Left-wing Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras called the snap poll after being trounced in May’s European parliamentary elections and several months after his coalition with a nationalist partner collapsed. It followed a grueling four years in office for Tsipras, largely defined by economic…

There is enormous development ahead of Latvia’s National Armed Forces (NAF) in the next decade, said NAF Commander Leonīds Kalniņš in an interview to public broadcaster LTV programme Rīta panorama on 5 July. According to Kalniņš, in the next decade Latvia’s armed forces can expect a considerable increase in technological provision and intensity of military exercises. Latvia’s NAF commander also admits that the main military base in Ādaži is slowly…

Estonia is to transpose two directives of the European Union into its national law — one on the protection of the Union’s financial interests and the other on the rights of minors who are suspects or accused persons in criminal proceedings. The government at a sitting on Thursday endorsed a bill amending the Penal Code and relating laws; the amendments will transpose into Estonian national legislation a directive on the…